SHOPPING MAULS : It Might Not Seem Possible, but You Still Have Time to Do Your Christmas Buying--and Come Out of It Alive

Anita Lewis remembers last year’s Christmas shopping season all too well. She and her husband drove from their Stanton home, pulled into the Buena Park Mall parking lot and began waiting for a parking space. And waiting. And waiting. And waiting some more. They finally gave up in disgust, took their money home and ordered presents by phone.

This year she started her Christmas shopping in January. She’s finished now.

Sue Kirby, like most of the rest of America, is most definitely not finished with her holiday shopping yet. But Kirby, who operates an El Toro decorating service that helps transform houses for the holidays, does have a battle plan.

“I work 16 hours a day, have three kids and a business,” she said. “And all my shopping will be done in one place. It’s the only way. If you make up your mind you’re not going to leave the store until you have it done, you’ll get it done.”

See? It can be done. Some malls have more parking this year than last year. Some have valet parking. Some stores are making it easier to get a present gift-wrapped than the customary system, which required a walk from one end of the store to the other, a trek up three flights and finally a line longer than those at Rose Bowl restrooms on New Year’s Day.

It can be done. But the time to start is now. Others have begun already; some have finished. For those who didn’t shop by mail, for those who didn’t start buying in January, for those who have not yet thrown up their hands in despair and decided that because Christmas comes every year they can skip this year’s version, the 30-day countdown begins Friday.

The day after Thanksgiving marks the traditional start of the shopping season, what Maura Eggan, marketing director at South Coast Plaza, calls “the official launch.”

“We have found in actuality that Christmas shopping begins before that,” Eggan said. For instance, on Saturday the mall counted 48,000 cars in its parking lots. “We figure conservatively 2.1 people per car,” Eggan added, meaning that those who got the jump on tradition jammed the mall last weekend.

In fact, some shops began the Christmas season in October. Temperatures were in the 80s. The humidity was high. Halloween, let alone Thanksgiving, was still weeks off. Yet there were the Trim-a-Tree shops opening up at the Broadway, Neiman Marcus and Robinson’s at Fashion Island in Newport Beach. Santa and dozens of trees went on display at Lindsay’s, a South Coast Plaza gift store.

It’s a phenomenon that Peggy Everett, display manager at Roger’s Gardens in MainPlace/Santa Ana, noticed early. Her store, which displays $325 artificial Christmas trees draped with $20 orna1835363956reindeer topiary, was decorated for Christmas by Oct. 7.

“We’ve already sold out of a number of things,” said Everett, delivering a bit of doom and gloom for those who thought a month was plenty of time to do their Christmas shopping. “And it’s not the cheaper things; it’s the more expensive things that are really going. They’re buying up place settings eight at a time. Some of the caroling and Dickens figures are gone. People say we’re starting (to sell) too early, but people start to panic that it’ll all be gone. They’re starting to buy earlier.”

One of the early birds was Nancy Herrick of Anaheim Hills.

“I’m two-thirds of the way finished,” said the mother of three, who last week was contemplating a $49 Gem Lite (descendant of the Lava Lamp) at the Sharper Image in MainPlace/Santa Ana. “I usually start by August or September, and I’ll be done by the 10th of December. I’m not a last-minute shopper. I just won’t do it.”

Almost anything can raise the hackles of a harried Christmas shopper, but waiting for a parking space while your lunch hour disappears is a major headache.

If you’re determined to get out of the car, you can’t be too picky about finding a parking spot closest to the stores. Spaces in the far corners and out-of-the way crannies can usually be found; you just have to know where to look.

Grizzled troopers may remember previous-year pileups along Bristol Street at South Coast Plaza. Maura Eggan, marketing director of South Coast Plaza, urges shoppers to enter parking lots from Sunflower Avenue, South Coast Drive and Bear Street to avoid the traditional jams along Bristol Street. The north parking structure off Sunflower and the west one off Bear Street are better bets than the south parking structure, closest to Bristol Street and the San Diego Freeway, which fills up first.

Also to help ease the parking crunch, the mall requires employees to park outside of the 13,500-space lot and shuttles them to work.

At the Brea Mall, which is undergoing an $80-million face lift, two new parking decks have been built to add 900 spaces, making a total of 5,753 spots. Head for these decks on the northwest side of mall near Nordstrom.

Fashion Island, also undergoing remodeling, has built a new two-level deck for 1,200 new spaces near the Broadway in the Bullock’s Wilshire wing. Another spot to head for is the lot southeast of Atrium Court near Miguel Drive and Newport Center Drive.

And MainPlace/Santa Ana has a three-level parking deck on the west side of the center that fills up long after the generally jammed lots in front of Nordstrom and Bullock’s off Main Street. From the two entrances on Main Street, drive around the mall to the west side and head for the deck or the spots in front of Roger’s Gardens and the MainPlace MarketPlace.

If you would rather have someone else park the car, head for valet parking. South Coast Plaza has six valet stations: three at the Plaza and three at Crystal Court. The cost is $2.50. Brea Mall has two valet stations, also at $2.50 a car. And Fashion Island has one complimentary valet parking service at the Pacifica Entrance near Bullock’s Wilshire and one $2 valet station in front of Atrium Court.

Along with plentiful parking, you will need boxes for your purchases. And nothing is quite so exasperating as having to traipse across the store to pick up a box once a purchase is made. “May I have a box for that shirt, please?” “Yeah. Gift Wrap. Second level, behind easels.” Grrrrrrr.

Addressing this, many of the major department stores--including Bullock’s, Robinson’s and Nordstrom--stock gift boxes at the registers. Some--Sears and the Broadway, for instance--still direct customers elsewhere.

So, if every minute counts, head for the stores with the boxes at the registers. And don’t overlook the other little helpers that can get the job done faster.

A big time-saver is Nordstrom’s Sally Brown personal shopper service. Customers can call up any store and ask for Sally Brown. A hostess will be paged to assist the caller in selecting gifts at Nordstrom and will even have the items picked out and waiting for the customer at the register. Or the Sally Brown hostess will meet the shopper at the store.

Another convenience, shuttle buses, can speed things up when you’re covering expansive territory, such as the more than 2,104,236 square feet of retail space and well over 200 stores at South Coast Plaza. South Coast has a free shuttle between Crystal Court and the plaza, with pickups at the main Crystal Court entrance, Nordstrom and Bullock’s. The tram holds 75 shoppers and runs about every 9 minutes.

Of course, shuttle buses, convenient boxes and a plethora of parking spaces won’t help those who have waited until the last minute to enter the fray.

Kirby, the operator of the El Toro decorating service Out of the Woods and the one who plans to shop in just one store, said that four weekends just isn’t enough time for working people to complete their Christmas shopping.

“I think it’s worth calling in sick and going on Tuesday,” she said. “It’s too hard on your weekends otherwise.”

She also advises avoiding checkout lines: “If there’s anything you’re going to use your kids for, it’s standing in line.”

Deborah Barnum, a Santa Ana public defender and self-described shopping expert, offers some more time-saving tips: Pick up gift baskets of preselected gourmet and toiletry items from Crabtree & Evelyn, and they will ship them for you for a $3.50 charge. She also recommends the one-stop mailing and packaging services (look under “mail” and “packaging” in the Yellow Pages for the service you want).

Some shoppers have plenty of time but little patience. Xavier, a Newport Beach florist and confessed shopping addict, says his favorite stores are Neiman Marcus at Fashion Island and the Polo/Ralph Lauren Shop at South Coast Plaza. But for Christmas shopping, he adores the Orange County Swap Meet. The selection is great, and it’s all in one place.

“I’ve been one time and I loved it. I’m definitely going back,” he said. “Who knows what my aristocratic friends will be getting for Christmas this year?”

Another who is planning alternatives to shopping centers is Cynthia Marcos of Santa Ana. The 24-year-old student caught the Bah Humbug early this year. As an antidote, she is giving everyone gift certificates and letting them fend for themselves after the holiday.

“I hate shopping, I hate malls and I hate picking out presents for people,” she said through gritted teeth. “Let them do it themselves after the holidays. This is my last trip to the malls.”